“Why keep me in the dark all this time? And what about Cleo? You went to prom with her, man, you didn’t even tell her about that?”
“Didn’t exactly want to bring it up again.” Ash looked him in the eye. “More than anything, I wanted to believe it was all over. That the curse was gone. There was nothing I could do about it, anyway. Right?”
Mauricio pursed his lips and looked away.
Ash kicked at the rubble. This was useless. If the safe hadn’t been destroyed in the fire, somebody must have found it by now and made off with it. He threw down the length of wood he’d been digging with.
Just as he turned to go, the sun came out from behind a cloud, warming his skin, changing the shadows around him from blue to gold. In the space between two boards at his feet, metal flashed in a crack of light. He bent closer. The scorched steel handle of his dad’s safe gleamed up at him from the darkness.
Chapter Twenty-four
Lost City
Clearing away the blackened boards, Ash uncovered the safe. It was small, barely a foot square. The handle and dial were covered in soot and mud, but they still turned. The combination was Ash’s birthday, but he decided not to share that fact with Mauricio.
The lock clicked and he pulled on the handle. As dirty and heat-discolored as it was, it turned easily. He lifted the thick door and the hinges squealed. Inside the soft darkness was a bundle of envelopes and an old book, all held together with twine. Carefully, he felt around the cold confines of the safe to make sure there was nothing else. Only then did he stand up and lead Mauricio out of the ruins.
Ash sat down on a rock and worked at the knotted twine. Without a word, Mauricio sat down on the grass next to him. As if summoned, Moolah loped across the ridge and nuzzled up against Mauricio, tail wagging.
The wind died down across the mountainside, leaving them in silence beneath the hot sun. With unsteady fingers, Ash undid the knot and threw the bristly twine aside.
The stack of envelopes felt slippery in his hands. They were full of black and white photos of people he didn’t recognize. He handed them to Mauricio, who pulled the photos out one by one.
The book was a worn leather-bound journal with a gap in the middle. The paper was yellowed and loose in the binding, threatening to break free at every turn of the page. His dad’s flowing handwriting, tough to read even in the best circumstances, was made worse by cheap ink that had faded to faint brown scrawls.
Odd names floated out at him: Vaupés, Caquetá. The dates were all from before he was born. As Ash flipped through the journal, picking up tidbits here and there, he realized it was a day-by-day account of a journey through a place called the “heart of the world.” He found a reference to Bogotá and realized where it was.
“Colombia,” he said out loud.
Mauricio looked up. “What are you reading?”
“Dad’s journal. I can’t make out a lot. But from what I can tell, it’s like he was hiking through the jungle.”
Ash kept turning pages, catching snippets about mosquitoes, tribal legends, and something called FARC, which they were terrified of. It took him a while to figure out they were some kind of revolutionary fighters. But they never made an appearance.
One page showed a sketched diagram of curved and straight lines, seemingly random at first. A note below it said ‘Petroglyphic map carved into boulder.’ Something about the inscription made Ash want to turn the page and forget he ever saw it. But the more he studied it, the more it intrigued him. Two central ovals, one above the other. The top one ended in a point. The bottom one had two stubby lines jutting down out of it, and four longer lines coming out on either side, each one bent in the middle.
*
It took Ash a moment to figure out that the drawing formed a rough stick figure of a spider.
He turned the page and read the next line aloud: “Today, at last, we found the lost city.”
“Seriously. In the jungle?” Mauricio pushed his glasses back up his nose. “Our dad?”
Ash didn’t answer. He was lost in lavish descriptions of steps carved into the mountainside, slick moss-covered trails and flat terraces linked by tiled roads. His dad’s words were filled with awe and excitement, the rush of discovering something lost for thousands of years. His speculation about the people who lived there, the long-vanished natives who worshiped spiders.
And then, abruptly, it ended. A huge section of the book, as much as a quarter-inch thick, was missing. Ash couldn’t tell whether the pages had been torn out or if the book had simply fallen apart somewhere. The page after that held only three words.
“Amnesic shellfish poisoning?”
Mauricio looked up again. “That’s what it says?”
“Yeah. With a question mark.”
“Oh. Great.” Mauricio went back to the bundle of photos. “Quick, somebody call the FDA for a seafood recall. But seriously, a lost jungle city?”
“Hey, read the book.” Ash held it up. “Amnesic. You think that has something to do with the spider? With the memory loss?”
“I don’t know. Do spiders eat shellfish?”
“I don’t think so. But check this out.” Ash flipped back to the first section, before the missing pages, and haltingly read aloud. “To these people, shellfish are sacred to the gods when—” He squinted. “In. In the season the river bleeds.”
Mauricio stared off into space, plainly thinking about it. “The season the river bleeds. What is that, like lava? Volcanic eruption?”
“Algae?”
“Shrimp?”
Ash gave him a puzzled look.
Mauricio shrugged. “You know, like a big explosion in the shrimp population. I don’t know.”
“Shrimp live in the ocean.”
“Whatever.” Mauricio went back to flipping through the photos. Abruptly, he stopped and held one up. His face turned pale.
“What?” Ash reached out and took the photo.
It was a creased black and white shot from when his dad was a young man, standing in a jungle with long curly hair and a fully loaded backpack. Behind him, rough stone steps led up a moss-covered hillside between towering trees and vines. He had his arm around a beautiful young Latina woman, and next to her stood a dour-faced man with a family resemblance.
“Turn it over,” Mauricio said softly.
Handwritten on the back in flowing cursive: Me, Selena, Andres.
Ash stared, first at the names, then the young faces smiling back at him in black and white, features washed out by the faded film. Ash realized he looked uncannily like his dad, just as Mauricio looked like Andres. The beautiful young Hispanic woman between them was Mauricio’s mom, who had died before Ash was born. His dad had remarried a woman from Tennessee.
Mauricio, still sitting cross-legged, put his hands out to either side of him, as if to hold himself up. His face, still pale, gave him a sickly pallor. “If Dad took my mom home to America, and brought the spider with him, then Andres might be telling the truth.”
“About what?”
“What if Andres found the spider, and Dad stole it from him?” Mauricio stared into the distance. “Is that where the curse comes from? Is that why my mom died when I was a baby? Did everything happen because Dad stole the spider out of the jungle?”
Ash felt like the world he knew was slowly falling apart. “How could that be possible? You said yourself, there’s no scientific basis for any of this.”
But Mauricio grew even paler. “Andres was right. We can’t stop it. Can we? How do we break the curse?”
Ash shook his head. He didn’t know.
Yet.
Chapter Twenty-five
Badge
It seemed like a pretty unlikely place to find a million-dollar counterfeiter. Cleo pulled off the frontage road and circled around the long brick building to the back, where loading docks and fenced-in equipment were hidden from the road. She parked near a short flight of concrete steps that ended in a gray metal door marked OFFICE. Aside from a s
emi-truck idling at the far end of the lot, nothing moved.
There had to be more to it than this. Cleo chewed on a fingernail, checking out the half-full parking lot. Older pickup trucks, some station wagons and minivans. Aside from a low-rider with gold wheels and primer-gray fenders, everything seemed perfectly ordinary.
Still, two solid leads pointed to this building. The biggest one was the registration to DMT’s Porsche, although it wasn’t parked anywhere in sight. The second was the strange phone call she’d gotten the week before, when a man had given her this address and then hung up, no explanation.
Weird. But then, everything that led to Andres was weird.
Cleo deliberately hadn’t told Graves about any of this. As long as he was toeing the party line about her being suspended, trying to get his help with tracking down Andres was more trouble than it was worth. And whenever Graves got involved, things seemed to keep looking worse and worse for Ash.
Still sitting behind the wheel of her Jeep, Cleo took a deep breath and let it out. She had to be careful about this. If she could find this Prez, whoever he was, then it brought her one step closer to finding Andres. As long as she could keep Graves from strangling everything with procedure.
As if summoned by her thoughts, Graves pulled in behind her and parked.
“You have got to be kidding me,” she whispered. She got out of her Jeep and marched over to his gray sedan, trying to put on a convincing smile. Graves got out and straightened the lapels of his jacket.
“That was quick,” she said. “I expected you’d be back in the office writing all that up.”
“Snyder called the Secret Service on that briefcase. They’re flying an anti-counterfeiting unit down to Denver.”
That stopped her cold. It was exactly the sort of thing she was worried about. The last thing Ash needed was more heat. “Secret Service. No kidding?”
“No kidding.” He looked past her, up and down the length of the building. “What’s in here?”
“My chiropractor.”
He smiled and took his sunglasses off. His eyes were warm and bright in the morning sun. “No, seriously. You have another lead I should know about.”
“Listen, Graves,” she began.
His smile vanished. “Don’t shut me out, Cleo. I ran that license plate for you, no questions asked, because I respect you. I let you into that house.”
“And now you’re following me?” she said.
“I think you’re a good investigative agent. If you find something, I want to be there.”
“I know, Graves. And if things were different, I would want you along. But this is personal.”
“You think this ties into your crusade against Andres. Right? And you think that I’m going to come in here and rain on your parade.”
“Don’t come in here and step on this,” she said. “I need this.”
“I am trying to help you.” He turned away, his whole body tense. “Look, you want me to be honest with you. So I’ll be honest. I think you’re out of control, Cleo. I think you’ve got your bearings confused.”
“That’s not your call to make.”
“The hell it isn’t. I need to trust you. I need to know that you’re operating in an ethical, professional manner, and you make that damn hard to do.”
Cleo leaned in close, looking up into his eyes. “I can’t make you trust me. I can’t. All I can do is make sure that Andres doesn’t get away this time. If you’re with me on that, then stick with me. But if you’re not? Then just stay out of my way.”
Graves stood stock still, looking right back down at her. The hardness in his eyes was like a brick wall between them. “With everything that’s going on, I can understand where you’re coming from.”
“Can you?”
“But you’re going about it the wrong way.”
“Graves, don’t—”
“Remember.” He put a hand on her arm. “I am not your enemy. You already put your career on the line. I just want to be here to help you salvage it before you push it over the edge.”
“My career. You think that’s what’s on my mind right now?” She stepped closer, invading his space. “Everything leads back to Andres. Do you see that? It does. And I am going to find him, even if you can’t. Or won’t.”
The muscles in his jaw worked. “Snyder suspended you for a reason. Even if you don’t agree with it, and even if I don’t agree with it, that’s the way it is. So take that into consideration. Any evidence you find against Andres will be inadmissible in court. You need me to validate this.”
She thought of Andres in his black car, slipping away from Gates. Out into the city, beyond anyone’s grasp. Meanwhile, the grass over her father’s grave up in the mountains would start gathering dead leaves soon, then snow. All while Andres was walking around in the sunshine, making millions from his drug cartel.
“You need me,” Graves said, “if you want any chance of winning at trial.”
“Who said I want to give Andres a trial?” The words came out before she could stop them. She could see in Graves’s face that he realized the full implications before she did.
She turned and marched toward the door, feeling adrenaline coursing through her like a shot of liquid cold, making her heart pound, her head feel light.
I’m going to kill Andres, she realized. Not arrest him. Not bring him to justice.
Kill him.
The thought terrified her.
And worse, now Graves knew her secret, too.
She got halfway to the door before Graves caught her elbow and turned her around. “Cleo, wait.”
She pulled herself free. “Don’t.” She couldn’t meet his gaze.
Graves bent down so his lips were near her ear. His voice dropped to a whisper, confidential but urgent. “Andres is not worth it. Do you understand? He is not worth it.”
She screwed her eyes shut tight. “You don’t know what it’s like. You can’t.”
“Listen to me.” He put his hands on her shoulders. “You’re stronger than this. You have to work inside the system, Cleo. You have to.”
At last, she opened her eyes. His face was inches from hers. “The system won’t find Andres.”
“I will not let you do this,” Graves said.
She gave him a long, steady look. “Then try to stop me.” She broke free and headed up the concrete steps.
Graves followed, not saying a word.
After Cleo stepped inside, it took her eyes a second to adjust to the murky light. The long fluorescent bulbs high above shone down on towering steel racks, loaded with pallets of boxes wrapped in plastic. A few voices carried from the far end of the warehouse, along with the beeping of something backing up.
Near them, DMT’s shiny black Porsche SUV sat facing a garage door, gold trim shining. Soapy water pooled in low spots on the floor, slowly draining through a metal grate. DMT came around the vehicle, making it look smaller when he stood next to it.
He wiped up stray drops of water with a red rag. He had his skinny black tie thrown over his shoulder. The sleeves of his white shirt were rolled up, the muscles in his arms working. He had a patch of gauze taped to the side of his head.
Cleo felt a little surge of excitement work its way up and down her spine. She was close to something. She could feel it.
DMT spotted her. His baby face showed a flash of recognition, then uncertainty. He straightened up.
Graves didn’t break stride. He flashed his badge at DMT and kept walking. DMT stepped directly in his path, arms crossed, blocking him.
“We’re federal agents,” Graves snapped. “Just go back to washing the car.”
“Uh-uh.” DMT shook his massive head. “Not less you got an appointment.”
Graves held up his badge again, as if DMT hadn’t seen it. “Need me to spell this out for you?”
Cleo put a hand on Graves’s arm and pushed it down, not too gently. “Demetrius, hey.”
“Hey.” He nodded down at her. “You seen Mauricio?�
�
She thought about lying to him, then immediately discarded that idea. “No. I’m a little worried. Did he call you?”
DMT shook his head.
“How’re you feeling?”
He shrugged. “Got a headache.”
She jerked her thumb at Graves. “You can have this guy. I just stopped by to chat with Prez.”
Again, DMT slowly shook his head. “I can’t let you in. You got to make an appointment. That’s the rule.”
“Graves,” she said slowly, “go make an appointment. Please.”
Graves stared at her as if she was a puzzle he couldn’t figure out. “You’re not serious.”
Cleo lifted her eyebrows and tilted her head at DMT. “He seems adamant.”
DMT brought his face down close to Graves’s. “You want her to spell it out for you, big man?”
Graves’s gaze slid over to DMT, then back to Cleo. He gave her a desolate smile. “Okay, Cleo. You win.” Then he walked out, his shoes echoing as he went. The door let in a blinding rectangle of sunlight and then slammed shut. The sound crashed through the warehouse.
Cleo swallowed down the sour feelings inside her and turned to DMT.
He held up two thick fingers. “I’m a give you two minutes with the boss. And then I come get you. You packing?”
She held her jacket open, not showing the .40 caliber pistol behind her back. “I don’t even have a badge.”
“I’m goin’ to believe you this once.” He held up two fingers again. “Understand?”
She could’ve kissed him. “Thanks. Be right out.”
“A’ight.” He shook out the red rag and went back to drying off the Porsche. Somewhere in the distance of the warehouse, a phone rang.
Chapter Twenty-six
Benjamins
It didn’t take Cleo long to find Prez’s office. She just followed the thin strains of old funk music. Prez turned out to be a thin, middle-aged black guy in a sharp suit. He leaned over a granite counter in a little kitchenette, assembling a salad, his back to her. The stainless steel door of an expensive-looking refrigerator stood open next to him.
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